The MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour

INTRO

ROBERT MacNEIL: Good evening. In the news today, President Reagan agreed to dismantle two nuclear submarines to stick with the SALT treaty. Moscow says 36 divided U.S.-Soviet families can reunite. The administration renewed defense and aid assurances to Honduras. We'll have details of these and other stories in our news summary in a moment. Jim?

JIM LEHRER: After the news summary, we have a newsmaker interview with the president of Honduras, a Congressional debate over U.S. attitudes toward the Contadora peace process in Central America, a documentary report on the radicalization of young blacks in South Africa, and finally a look at the English language. News Summary

LEHRER: President Reagan has decided to stay in compliance with the unratified SALT II treaty and to retire two nuclear submarines to accomplish that. The subs are the Poseiden class, and each has 16 multiple warhead missiles. Their retirement was made necessary by the planned deployment of the new Trident submarine this summer. Mr. Reagan said he would observe the SALT treaty as long as the Soviets did the same, but he said today there had been Soviet violations and warned the U.S. will not continue to unilaterally support a flawed SALT structure. White House spokesman Larry Speaks made today's announcement.

LARRY SPEAKS, White House spokesman: In the future, the United States will base decisions regarding its strategic forces on the nature and magnitude of the threat posed by the Soviet Union, rather than on standards contained in the expired SALT agreements unilaterally observed by the United States. It has simply been a one-way street of compliance by the United States on one hand, and outright noncompliance by the Soviet Union on the other hand. So we looked at the lack of Soviet reciprocity, and we decided that it was not in our interest to continue down this road.

LEHRER: SALT II was signed by President Carter and Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev in 1979, but was never ratified by the U.S. Senate. Robin?

MacNEIL: The Soviet Union has followed through on one Geneva summit promise. Moscow said that 117 people would be allowed to leave to rejoin family members in this country. It is the largest number of divided family cases resolved at one time since Washington began pushing such cases 30 years ago. The move was welcomed by State Department spokesman, Charles Redman.

CHARLES REDMAN, State Department: It is a positive step that will contribute to an improved atmosphere in our relations and will facilitate efforts to build on the progress begun at the Geneva summit last year. This act gives real meaning to the joint statement by President Reagan and General Secretary Gorbachev on the importance of resolving humanitarian cases in a spirit of cooperation.

MacNEIL: In Berlin, East German border guards permitted U.S., British and French diplomats to pass today without showing their passports, but threatened they would have to in the future. Other NATO diplomats were turned back. The East Germans started the new practice at Checkpoint Charlie, the crossing point between West and East Berlin, yesterday. Previously, diplomats of the three World War II occupying powers had to show only passes, not passports. They feared the new demand could signal an attempt by East Germany to convert the sector border into an international fronteir. The East Germans said the measures were designed to fight terrorism. The Western powers have banned Libyan diplomats from West Berlin, following the bombing of a discotheque there -- terrorism which Washington blamed on Libya.

LEHRER: President Reagan got a report today on the weekend Contadora summit meeting. It came from President Jose Azcono of Honduras. The Contadora session in Guatemala ended without full agreement on how a Central America peace process should proceed. Azcona is considered a supporter of U.S. policy in the region, including support for the anti-Sandinista contra guerrillas of Nicaragua, some of whom operate from bases in Honduras. After their White House meeting, President Reagan and Azcona spoke of Contadora and threats to peace.

Pres. RONALD REAGAN: President Azcona and I agree that our countries and the other democracies in the region must act together to end the conflict that plagues Central America. Honduras has been diligent and persistent. It has pursued a comprehensive and verifiable solution within the framework of the Contadora negotiations. Mr. President, you have our support in these efforts.

JOSE AZCONA, president, Honduras [through interpreter]: President Reagan reiterated to me, as long as grave threats to Honduras security and to the stability of our institutions persist, the government of the United States will be prepared in the case of armed aggression against Honduras to render it any necessary assistance which the Honduran government may request.

LEHRER: In Pakistan today, a bomb blast killed a security guard outside a Pan Am Airways office in Karachi. Other explosions caused damage, but no injuries, at three offices of Saudi Arabia's national airlines in the Pakistani capital.

MacNEIL: The United Nations General Assembly today opened a special session on the economic problems of Africa -- the first ever devoted to the plight of one region. The head of the organization for African unity, President Abdou Diouf of Senegal, appealed to the developed world for $85 billion in aid and debt relief over the next five years. The White House welcomed the session, but said the adoption of democratic free market policies would help ease the continent's economic problems. Secretary of State George Shultz will speak to the session tomorrow.

Near Capetown, South Africa, the government began clearing the ruins of the Crossroads shanty town, almost destroyed in fighting last week between rival groups of black squatters. We have a report from Michael Buerk of the BBC.

MICHAEL BUERK: It's been a small scale black civil war. These are the shacks of those who won, these what's left of the homes of those who lost the fight for control of the squatter city. It's both a primitive struggle to rule and a modern war of ideologies. The victorious gang of chieftains, called the Fathers, represent an old-style urge for power. Their womenfolk are now looting the homes of those who followed the Comrades, the gang with new slogans of radical, anti-apartheid protest. The police swarmed around the fighting, but failed to stop it. Many said they joined in to help the Fathers.

The battle's over, even if the war isn't, and the army has moved in. The security forces say they're impartial -- they only want to keep the peace as they stabilize the rule of the politically pliable.

GRAHAM LAWRENCE, government spokesman: I really don't think that any government could ever wish to have a disaster of this magnitude on its hands to achieve whatever ends it may have.

BUERK [voice-over]: Today the government was able to do what it has tried and failed to do for a decade -- move bulldozers into the radical warrens on Crossroads' fringes, into the wreckage of the bush settlements.

MacNEIL: In Washington, a special federal court announced that an independent counsel will be appointed to investigate the lobbying activities of former White House aide Michael Deaver. Deaver himself had asked that a special counsel be named to clear up questions of possible conflict of interest violations connected with his work on behalf of Canada and other foreign governments. The three judge panel set no date for the appointment.

LEHRER: There were three business stories of note today. The SperryCorporation agreed to be taken over by Burroughs Corporation, a competitor in the computer business. The price was $4.8 billion. There is a boom in the housing market. The National Association of Realtors said existing home sales jumped 11.3% in April to an annual rate higher than any since 1979. Prices were also up more than at any time since 1981. The association said the lowest interest rates in seven years were responsible. And local union presidents from Bethlehem steel plants approved a major contract with wage and benefit cuts. It would reduce hourly wages for 30,000 employees in four states by $1.96 an hour.

MacNEIL: Finally, one of the nation's oldest newspapers died today. The Baltimore News American, which began life in 1773, published its last edition. Once the largest circulation paper in Baltimore, the News American had been up for sale for some time, but its owners, the Hearst Corporation, had failed to find a buyer. The 500 employees learned of the shutdown only an hour before the final edition went to press.

That's our news summary. Coming up, an interview with the president of Honduras and a debate about U.S. policy in Central America, a documentary report on the new radicalism among young South African blacks, and a talk with the editor of the Oxford English Dictionary. Nicaragua: What's Next?

LEHRER: We look first tonight at the story that never ends -- the search for and the argument over peace in Central America. The latest event was the weekend's summit meeting of Central American government leaders in Guatemala. The president of Honduras was at that meeting, and today he was in Washington, where he sat down with President Reagan, and afterward with our special correspondent, Charles Krause. Here is the interview, preceded by some background on the man who's interviewed, Jose Azcona.

CHARLES KRAUSE [voice-over]: Jose Azcona is a 59-year-old conservative politician whose foreign policy views dovetail neatly with those of the Reagan administration. An engineer by training, Azcona was inaugurated president of Honduras in January, after a hard-fought election campaign. Since then, he's publicly stated his support for continued U.S. military pressure to contain Nicaragua's Sandinista government. Honduras has become a key U.S. ally in Central America, bordering both Nicaragua and El Salvador. Azcona's country is sometimes referred to only half-jokingly as the U.S.S. Honduras, because of the presence of both U.S. troops and anti-Sandinista rebels. The Pentagon has been conducting U.S. military maneuvers throughout Honduras since 1983, providing U.S. troops with invaluable experience in rough terrain. Army and National Guard engineers have also built or improved at least seven airfields in Honduras, as well as roads, tank traps, and communications facilities. Both manned and unmanned U.S. military aircraft regularly use Honduran airfields to overfly Nicaragua and El Salvador, acquiring valuable aerial intelligence. In February, the Reagan administration asked Congress to approve an additional $50 million for the build up of U.S. and Honduran military facilities through 1991. In return for its cooperation, the Honduran government receives about $180 million worth of U.S. economic and military aid -- vital to a country that rivals Haiti as the poorest in the Western Hemisphere. Azcona says he supports a Central American peace process known as Contadora, but he's also known to be deeply suspicious of Nicaragua's left wing government -- his reason for allowinganti-Sandinista rebels to use Honduras as their principal base.

Known as the contras, the rebels are key to U.S. efforts to weaken the Sandinistas' hold over Nicaragua. Azcona arrived in Washington directly from Guatemala, where he had met over the weekend with other Central American presidents. At the White House today, the Honduran leader reportedly briefed President Reagan and other U.S. officials on the Guatemalan meeting. Shortly afterwards, we interviewed President Azcona in his Washington hotel. Our first question: why did he and the other Central American presidents postpone a June 6 deadline for signing a Contadora peace treaty?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: I don't think we can fix deadlines. That must be connected with even with the attitudes and the manifestations that the government of Nicaragua might show in connection with the opening up of democracy. That, of necessity, must occur vis-a-vis its own people.

KRAUSE: Are you saying then, in effect, that you do not believe a peace treaty is possible as long as the Sandinistas remain in power in Nicaragua?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: I believe it could be feasible, but there must be clear indicators that what is going to be signed in that act is going to be complied with by all the signers -- all the signatories. That is a doubt that exists at this moment, and it must be eliminated.

KRAUSE: Based on your conversations today with President Reagan and the other U.S. officials that you've met here, do not believe that the United States really wants a peace treaty, or is the administration's position to overthrow the government in Nicaragua?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: I believe that this will depend on the position that the government of Nicaragua adopts. It seems to me that for the United States, the matter of much tribulation for the problem to be solved favorably and without any cost or at the least possible cost, and that solution would be the opening up of the government of Nicaragua -- the beginning of conversations, talks, with the opposition -- with the civilian opposition, and with the armed opposition -- the announcement of forthcoming elections, freedom of the press and the other freedoms. The United States at that moment would feel freed from the political problem of Central America.

KRAUSE: But sir, given that the Sandinistas have said time and again that they are not going to negotiate with the contras and that they are not going to fulfill some definition that you may have of democracy, is there any real chance for any kind of peace treaty in the near future?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: That is precisely what makes the peace treaty a difficult thing. There is a clash, there is a contradiction in the coneptualization of what democracy is. But that discrepancy does not exist between the government of Nicaragua and the government of Honduras only. Those discrepancies, at this moment, exist between what the government of Nicaragua thinks and what the other governments of Central America think.

KRAUSE: But what right have you in your country and the other Central American countries to demand changes in the internal affairs of one of your neighbors? Shouldn't your principal concern be their activities outside of Nicaragua?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: We have every right to demand, because we are suffering the effects of the internal situation in Nicaragua. If the Nicaraguans were to build a wall along the border and could guaranteethat no refugees are going to come across and that there's not going to be any subversion in Honduras and that from the effects of that situation our border population would not be suffering, then we would not have that right.

KRAUSE: There are those who say that, in effect, Honduras is in a kind of trap -- that if there were to be a peace treaty, that the contras, who might have nowhere to go, might end up staying in your country and threaten political stability in your country. Is that something that concerns you?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: You're telling me that I'm right, at this very moment, as to why we have the right to demand democratization in Nicaragua, where those contras have the right to live and to work and to enjoy all the freedoms in Nicaragua, and the right also to have an option to reach power -- to achieve power. Because that is democracy. All the groups have the right to fight for power and to obtain it if the people's will gives it to them. This is why we are not in agreement with a signed peace where those aspects are going to remain and which is going to have negative repercussions against our country. You, sir, have shown that I am right.

KRAUSE: But again, do you expect a peace treaty this year?

Pres. AZCONA [through interpreter]: It's possible. Provided, as I say again, that the Sandinista government becomes aware of the geopolitical position, they assist in some why to solve its economic problems, and, over and above its dogmatism, they become realistic and have a large dose of pragmatism also, in the sense that they are not going to be able easily to convey their country toward totalitarianism.

KRAUSE: Thank you, Mr. President.

LEHRER: The Contadora peace process has been the center of controversy in this country from the beginning, and it still is. One of the hottest flashpoints now is over the role special U.S. envoy Philip Habib is playing in pushing President Reagan toward signing a peace agreement. Recently a group of conservative Republicans called for Habib's resignation. One of them was Congressman Dan Burton of Indiana, a member of the House Western Hemisphere Subcommittee. Another group of congressmen, mostly democrats, responded with a strong endorsement of Habib. One of them was Congressman David Bonior, Democrat of Michigan, Chairman of the House Leadership Task Force on Nicaragua. He joins us from public station WTVS in Detroit. Congressman Burton, why did you want Habib to go?

Rep. DAN BURTON (R) Indiana: Well, I think Mr. Habib cast a great deal of shadow on this problem in Central America. He said in a letter to Democrat leaders in the House that if an agreement was signed, there would be an immediate termination of aid to the contras, or freedom fighters, in Central America. The President has had a two-track approach from the beginning. Diplomatic negotiations and military assistance to the contras to put pressure on the Sandinista government to live up to the commitments they made in 1979 to the OAS. Now, Mr. Habib, I think, took a new approach, and the Reagan administration, I think, has corrected him this past weekend. I think they were justified in doing that.

LEHRER: You think Habib was operating on his own, not to the President for the United States?

Rep. BURTON: It may have been his interpretation of what the President's policy was. I don't know. But nevertheless, he made a terrible mistake, and it misled a lot of people in the Congress and leaders of the Central American countries.

LEHRER: What is basically wrong with his approach?

Rep. BURTON: Well, if you cut off aid to the contras the minute a Contadora agreement is signed, then there will be no opposition to force the communist Sandinista government to live up to the commitments that they've made. We know they'll violate those commitments, because they did in -- since they signed the agreement in 1979 with the OAS. And there has to be something to force the communists in Nicaragua to live up to any commitment they make. Mr. Habib, I think, led us down a path toward appeasement, which I think will lead to ultimately a military conflict if an agreement is signed under those conditions.

LEHRER: Congressman Bonior, what do -- how do you see Mr. Habib's role in this?

Rep. DAVID BONIOR (D) Michigan: Well, I think what's happened is that the administration has really knocked out the legs from underneath the whole Contadora peace process by really suggesting that Mr. Habib went to far, when in fact he hardly went far enough. He just sort of inched a little closer to trying to get some dialogue between the United States and Nicaragua on this critical issue. So if we can't live -- this administration can't live with the Habib letter, it seems to me it's going to be very, very difficult for us to live at all with the Contadora peace process.

LEHRER: In other words, you believe that what Habib was suggesting -- that if Nicaragua agrees to certain things, the United States should withdraw its support for the contra guerrillas?

Rep. BONIOR: Well, if Nicaragua agrees to do the things that we think are important -- to stop exporting revolution, to reduce the military strength of their army, to do the other things that are necessary to get rid of Cuban and Soviet advisors, then I think we have an obligation to live up to certain parts of the treaty that are very important to them, and that includes our reduction of the military influence in the region, as well as some other very important things that the Nicaraguans feel important -- that are important to their survival in the area. The Nicaraguans, it seems to me, are not going to unilaterally disarm or sign a treaty to disarm when they have an army of 20,000 people on their borders ready to attack them.

LEHRER: Congressman?

Rep. BURTON: The communists have violated almost every agreement they've made since World War II. A few examples are the 1954 Geneva accords on Indochina, the '62 declaration on the neutrality of Laos, the '53 --

LEHRER: Not the communists in Nicaragua, you mean just communists in general, right?

Rep. BURTON: No, but the point I was trying to make is that the Soviet Union and the Cubans, according to intelligence reports I've received, have been urging the communist Sandinista government to sign almost anything put in front of them, if it will mean there'll be no aid going to the contras. And --

LEHRER: Then they'll go away and just do what they want to.

Rep. BURTON: That's right. Once there's no viable opposition to the communist Sandinistas, then they'll violate the agreement. In fact, in the paper, I think last week, the president of the Honduran National Assembly indicated that everybody knows they'll violate the treaty within six months.

LEHRER: Congressman Bonior, how do you make sure the Sandinistas abide by the treaty?

Rep. BONIOR: Well, I think you have to make sure that the implementation process of the treaty is lived up to, and that's going to take a concerted effort by those countries involved in the Contadora process, as well as the diplomats throughout the Western world, to make sure that they live up to their part of the bargain, as well as us living up to our part of the bargain of the Contadora process. If, in fact, there are violations by the Sandinistas, then they're on very -- there are other options that can be taken to stress our necessity in terms of the security of our own country. For instance, if MIGs are brought in, if they try to export revolution to Costa Rica or Honduras or other Central American countries, we as a country have a right to defend our own interests, and no one is suggesting that we don't and won't -- or will.

LEHRER: Is -- excuse me, I was just going to say, is it your position that there will be no Contadora treaty without this agreement from the United States on the contras?

Rep. BONIOR: That is exactly my position.You know, the Contadora countries can only go so far in this process. They can dance up to the line, but eventually the United States has to play a part and has to be a partner in that dance. We are funding a proxy army which is responsible for the main conflict in the region today, and for there to be a Contadora peace process, the United States has to take an active interest in it and has to be serious about it. In 1984 we were not serious about it when we scuttled the treaty. We were not serious about it this year. And it seems to me that this latest effort by the administration and by my friend Dan Burton and others in the Congress calling for Habib's resignation indicates that the United States is not ready to deal with the Contadora peace process, and let the Latins try to resolve their own problems in that region of the world.

Rep. BURTON: One of the most important factors is that we -- Contadora says that there will be democracy in Nicaragua. How are you going to make sure that democracy occurs in Nicaragua if there's no pressure put upon them internally? There's a difference of opinion among the people in Nicaragua. Since Somoza was run out of office and the revolution took place in 1979 and was successful, the people were promised democracy. The contras are fighting for democracy. If the contras are eliminated as a viable political opponent of the Sandinista government, how will you ever achieve democracy then?

LEHRER: But what about his basic point that your arguments aside, there isn't going to be a Contadora peace treaty of any kind if the United States continues to hold the position that you hold, if it does hold that position.

Rep. BURTON: See, I am not overwhelmed with this idea that there should be a Contadora agreement just to get some kind of an agreement. What I'm concerned about is the cancer in Central America -- the communist cancer -- that's exporting revolution to over 12 countries down there be stopped. Now, Contadora just to get an agreement, to get something on paper as a solution to this problem, is not going to solve the problem. The problem is the communists exporting revolution and saying they're going to subvert those governments throughout Central America.

LEHRER: And a piece of paper isn't going to change that.

Rep. BURTON: It hasn't in the past in history.

LEHRER: Congressman Bonior?

Rep. BONIOR: Well, I think that what we see here is this administration wants to overthrow the Sandinistas militarily. They're not interested at this point in a negotiated settlement. This war has cost 40,000 Nicaraguan lives during the revolution and 12,000 after the revolution through this contra war. It seems to me that the American people are tired of spending $1 billion to fund this war. They don't want to put another $100 million down payment on it as we vote on this issue in the coming weeks. And it seems to me there are other more pressing issues that we ought to be talking about, in terms of those dollars and the interests of the American people.

Rep. BURTON: The communist Sandinista government promised democracy, freedom of the press, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly in 1979. They haven't lived up to one of those commitments. They're exporting revolution, and they've driven between 400,000 and 500,000 of their countrymen into exile right now. And those people, many of them, are coming to the United States, and we're having to house, clothe, feed and educate them. And we're going to have a virtual tidal wave of people if that problem down there isn't resolved. And the communist Sandinista government has said time and again they want a revolution without borders. It's a communist cancer, and we have to deal with that and not worry about just a piece of paper.

LEHRER: Congressman Bonior, what do you say to the concerns that President Azcona of Honduras gave to Charles Krause? He's essentially -- my interpretation of what he had to say was very pessimistic about the fact of -- about there being a contadora peace treaty. Do you share that?

Rep. BONIOR: Well, he didn't rule out it. He said there was a possibility that we may have a treaty this year. And I think the Contadora process is something like the domestic tax bill that we have. It's something that just won't die. Everyone thought it was dead, but the tax reform bill continues to live. And Contadora, everyone has pronounced its death prematurely now for the last four or five years, but it lives. And the reason it will, I think, eventually succeed is that this five year war has cost lives and dollars, and it's really gotten us nowhere. And it seems to me the pressure of the American people on members of Congress and on this administration will eventually get the Congress to look seriously and talk about dealing with this issue in terms of diplomatic solution.

LEHRER: But what about Congressman Burton's point that it's -- an agreement for agreement's sake solves nothing if it doesn't solve the overall problem.

Rep. BONIOR: Yes, but unless you take that first step to reach an agreement, there is only one other option. And, of course, that's the military option -- what this adminstration has tried to pursue. That will eventually lead American boys and men into war. We have literally thousands of U.S. troops stationed on the border today. This administration is spending hundreds of millions of dollars in military aid in the region, and it's only a matter of time in which we're going to find ourselves involved directly, militarily, and American boys coming home the way they did in Vietnam, and I don't think the American people really want that.

Rep. BURTON: I believe the exact opposite is true. If you sign an agreement that makes sure that the contras, or freedom fighters, are eliminated -- that there's no viable opposition to the communists -- they will make good on their threat to export revolution throughout Central and Latin America, and the cancer will spread and their army will grow. And at that point the United States will be directly threatened. We have a 2,000 mile border between us and Mexico, and we can't leave it exposed. And if we don't deal with the communist menace now by helping the freedom fighters, we'll have to deal with it later by using American troops to contain them. And the liberals in Congress want a policy of containment. Policies of containment didn't work in Vietnam, and they won't work in Central America.

LEHRER: And the beat and the fight goes on about Central American Contadora and the Congress of the United States. Thank you, gentlemen, both for being with us tonight.

Rep. BONIOR: Thank you.

Rep. BURTON: Thank you.

MacNEIL: The Contadora summit is the subject of tonight's Lurie cartoon. [Lurie cartoon: several Central American men hold a banner reading "Central-American Summit." They dance together and wave the banner. A wider view reveals that they are each dancing on their own individual summit -- several tall, skinny towers of rock close together.] South Africa

MacNEIL: Our focus shifts now to South Africa: One of the most violent episodes there in recent months was the fighting last week in the shanty town called Crossroads, near Capetown. As we saw in the news summary, government bulldozers began erasing evidence of the fighting that left some 50,000 people homeless. The fighting involved young black radicals known as the Comrades against older, more conservative blacks. This radicalization of young blacks has happened in many places, as we see in this documentary report by Michael Dutfield of the BBC program, Panorama.

MICHAEL DUTFIELD [voice-over]: Twenty miles west of Johannesburg, apartheid has shrunk to just 200 yards. Day and night the South African army watches over a narrow strip of land dividing white from black. The black is a decrepit township called Munsieville. At Christmas it was taken over by radical young people frustrated by poverty and impatient for change. The white is a smart, newly built suburb of a town called Krugersville. Since Christmas there, the people have begun to feel frightened.

Krugersville resident: You can see that it's not far, and there's nothing really between us and the black houses. And there's nothing really to stop them besides Monital Wall, which they would jump over. And, I mean, if there's a whole lot of them, there's no way that I'd be able to get out of here alive. If they did actually start rioting and come over here.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: Late last year, the young people in the township formed the Munsieville Youth Congress. Linked to the United Democratic Front, and thus to the band African National Congress, they form part of an organized web of young activists who have gained control of townships throughout South Africa. This now generation has learned something most of their parents never knew.

[on camera] What is the difference between the way your parents feel about white men and the way you feel about white men?

Munsieville Youth Congress member: The difference is that my parents have accepted the situation, and my parents are taking a while man as a person who is superior and a person who is never making a mistake. And right now where I'm -- what I'm realizing is I and a white man, we are on the same level. We can be wrong and we can be right. That is the difference between me and my parents.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The young people began their take over of Munsieville just before Christmas in Mugali Street. There they burnt down the house of Mr. Mabelone, one of the township's two counselors. South Africa's black counselors were part of a system set up by the government to give blacks a limited share in the control of theirown affairs. In reality, most of the power was retained by white officials. In the last few months, hundreds of counselors' homes have been attacked by young blacks.Thousands of counselors have resigned. Mr. Mabelone managed to escape from his burning house and now lives in exile 200 miles away.

[on camera] Did they want to kill the counselor or did they just want to punish him by burning his house?

SERGE MOKONYANE: What I can say is the youth is not prepared to kill, but the youth is prepared to educate.So it is a kind of a punishment, I can say.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: A similar fate almost befell Samuel Bogatsu. He was a constable in the South African police for three years until the Munsieville Comrades ordered him to quit.

SAMUEL BOGATSU: I was out of the South African police because of fears -- fears from the Comrades. One of my friends, they burned his house. His parents was burned. Childrens were burned. So I also fear that they will burn my house. They will burn, actually, my parents' house. And my child was also there. So I was afraid they will burn him also, and then --

DUTFIELD: Did anyone ever say anything to you?

Mr. BOGATSU: What they said is just told me well, you were a brother, so we dont't want to burn your house. But if you listen to us, leave the police force, then we won't burn it. But if you continue, we'll also do the same to you.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: Apartheid for South Africa's blacks has almost always meant deprivation. Apartheid laws like the Group Areas Act forced blacks to live in small areas set aside for them, often with the most primitive of facilities. Black unemployment in the urban townships is more than 30%. Those without jobs must support their families on handouts from friends. Many of those in work have not had pay raises for more than two years, and inflation is now reaching 20%. All this has proved fertile ground for those determined to change South Africa. Most urban townships are now controlled by young people -- the Comrades -- led by men like Serge Mokonyane.

[on camera] Is there a revolution going on in South Africa at the moment?

Mr. MOKONYANE: There is an advancing pace of struggle by our people. The forces are balancing within our communities from labor [unintelligible] organization, student organization, and even the church is now -- people are now moving towards a direction of having one voice, a systematic voice which will direct whatever can pay. And I don't know whether that has been regarded as revolution.

DUTFIELD: And when will you be satisfied?

Mr. MOKONYANE: We'll be satisfied if we have a major political share in the political structure of this country.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The rule of Munsieville's Comrades also applies in the heart of white Krugersdorf.

1st Man [translated with subtitle]: Where did you buy these things?

2nd Man [Translated with subtitle]: I didn't know it wasn't allowed.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The young people have ruled that blacks must not buy from white shops, and they mount patrols to enforce their law.

1st Man [translated with subtitle]: Wait, let me see what is in here. It is just Vaseline and fish oil. All these things must be taken back to where you bought them.

DUTFIELD: What are you doing here now by these shops? Why have you come here?

1st Man: Actually just to investigate which people are buying and what it's all about in the town.

DUTFIELD: This is to make sure that people from Munsieville are obeying the boycott.

1st Man: Yes. And if we find one has bought something, we just ask why did you doesn't obey with the law that buying the shelves.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The Comrades are imposing consumer boycotts throughout South Africa, insisting that blacks buy only from shopkeepers inside the township. A similar campaign to boycott the white-owned bus company in Krugersdorf has been equally effective. Blacks now move around exclusively in black-owned taxis.

Woman [translated with subtitle]: I thought it was okay to bufy fruit.

1st Man [translated with subtitle]: It has been made clear that nothing is to be bought in town.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: Empty white shops are now demonstrating to everybody in South Africa the ability of the Comrades to impose their will on entire communities.

[on camera] How much of your business here is with black people?

MANNY HELENA: Ninety-nine percent.

DUTFIELD: And what's been happening to your business, to your trade, since the boycott started?

Mr. HELENA: Well, it has dropped about 70%, some say, or 60%.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The control that the Comrades have over the townships is now being reinforced by the establishment of their own law courts. In a classroom in Munsieville's primary school, the Comrades hold what they call the People's Court. Every evening, from five until nine, offenders come up for trial. So far in Munsieville, the crimes have been petty -- boycott breakers and common assaults. But the intention is to try even the most serious crimes, and already punishments can be severe.

1st People's Court member [translated with subtitle]: Sometimes we have decided that maybe -- for example, juveniles -- must have lashes. About five lashes. Maybe for assaulting, and maybe for not respecting adults.

DUTFIELD: But there's no question, is there, of ever going back to using --

2nd People's Court member: The whites' courts. Not presently. Not in the near future.

DUTFIELD: Wahy is that?

2nd People's Court member: As we realize, people now want to govern themselves, so going back to the courts means we'll be going back to being governed by the very government that we wanted to break with.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The center of social life in Munsieville is Big Mama's Shabime, or beer hall and cafe. The Comrades ask regularly for donations to the struggle, and Big Mama always obliges. She says she doesn't know what would happen if she refused. But she's grateful to the Comrades for disarming Munsieville's criminal element late last year.

BIG MAMA MABOTE: To organize what they've got, all the dangerous weapons what they've got, then they left the place in peace, and it was the most way.

DUTFIELD: Did you have a good, happy Christmas as a result?

Ms. MABOTE: Quite a lot. A very fair time happy Christmas in all these years.

DUTFIELD: No fighting?

Ms. MABOTE: Nothing. Nothing. No murder, no fighting, no stabbings, no nothing.

DUTFIELD [voice-over]: The South African government says the Comrades are communists -- part of what it calls the total onslaught on South Africa directed from Moscow.But in Munsieville, established religion is at the very heart of community life, and many of the young people have turned to priests preaching the evils of apartheid.

Father PETER GALLOWAY, parish priest of Munsieville: I think it's important that the young people realizethat it is not God's will that any people should live under such a system. The young people see a great similarity, a great parallel, between themselves and the people of Israel at the time of the Exodus. And this image of the Exodus keeps on coming back into their ideas and kind of things they say and their songs and so on. So I feel that it is very important for everybody to realize that it is not God's will that this should happen to them.

DUTFIELD: You leave them in no doubt that the church is on the side of the struggle, as they call it.

Father GALLOWAY: Yes. The church is certainly on the side of the struggle. At the same time, I think it's important that we try to convey an image of liberation which doesn't simply give them the idea that once there's a new political system, then ultimately final liberation will have been achieved.

DUTFIELD: Is it unstoppable now? Are they so determined to go ahead until they get a completely different kind of society now that nothing can stop them?

Father GALLOWAY: Well, that is my impression, yes. I think that the -- that things can not return to what they were -- that the young people are absolutely determined that they're not going to live under the same oppression as their parents did. Modern English

MacNEIL: Finally tonight, we report on a major event in publishing -- the appearance of the final volume of the supplement to the Oxford English Dictionary. The OED is generally considered to be the most authoritative and complete guide to the English language. It was first published more than a century ago. It was the lifetime work of Sir James Murray, a self-taught Scotsman who spent 35 years shepherding the project. Updating the OED for this century has taken almost as long -- 30 years to complete four supplementary volumes. The final volumes, S to Z -- or S to zed, as they would say -- begins with the word se -- a Chinese stringed instrument -- and ends with Zyrian -- a Russian tribe. Many of the words in between are very familiar and distinctly American: soap opera, from entertainment; software, from computer science; Watergate, from politics. Not to mention one of the newest words, yuppie, defined as "a jocular them for a member of a socio-economic group comprising young professional people working in cities." Deciding which words to include and which not to has been the work of the dictionary's editor, Robert Burchfield, a New Zealander who has devoted most of his career to the OED supplement.

Mr. Burchfield, I understand your assignment 30 years ago was to update English English. Would you describe what happened to that concept along the way?

ROBERT BURCHFIELD, dictionary editor: Well, I had really not much idea myself, but the idea was to, well, put a little building on the end of the great skyscraper of the Oxford English Dictionary. And that is a very British English work with occasional American words let in, as it were, by special grace and favor. I am a colonial -- a New Zealander -- and that didn't seem to me to be the right way to go about it. And I thought it really not right to follow too conservative a policy. English was burgeoning everywhere, especially in the United States, but also in Australia and Canada and elsewhere. And I pursued a policy -- a slightly rebellious policy. I had no idea it would lead me to take 29 years to carry out this policy, but I decided that English everywhere had to be given the same treatment.

MacNEIL: I've seen you quoted as saying that English -- that American English is now the most important branch of English. Why is it the most important?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Well, it's a simple numerical statement. It's saying something fairly obvious. There are something in the order of 240 or 250 million American speakers of English as a first language. There are only 50 million speakers of British English as a first language. It's obvious that if you've got that kind of numerical discrepancy, the leader will be the one with the greater number of speakers.

MacNEIL: Why is it that American English in this century seems to be more creative than British English? It seems to be throwing out many more new words, which you've included in your supplement, than English speaking -- British English speakers do.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Well, I think it must in the end come -- there have been many explanations for that, but I think in the end it must come from the very -- oh, the makeup of the community. That is, America has got many races, many people, many types and varieties of speech, many communities. It's a much more complex society, apart from being more numerous, American society. Many of them Spanish speakers, many are black, and there are many Poles here, there are many Russians and so forth, Germans -- Pennsylvanian Germans. And out of this melting pot of people has come a language of immense creative power.

MacNEIL: I saw you quoted as saying, when the dictionary was published -- when the supplement was published in England a few weeks ago -- that American was driving the language at the moment.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Did I say that

MacNEIL: Well, I don't know. Did you?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: I must have said something which suggested that American English was the front runner of the two. If you are living in a foreign country like Germany or Japan or Russia or China or somewhere, you must make a deliberate choice as to whether to learn American English or British English. The choice used to favor British English in most cases, not every one. Nowadays the choice is almost automatic that it's American English first.

MacNEIL: Do you run into a lost of resistance from people who simply hate the fact that you have -- Americans included -- who hate the fact that you've included in this auguest work words like yuck and yuppie and just don't think they should be in there.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Yes, it's most extraordinary. The conservatism of people towards language is recally quite extraordinary. I think it probably comes about because most people have on their shelves a collegiate-size dictionary or a Concise Oxford Dictionary or something of this sort. And they think that that is the full flow of the Mississippi River -- that that is the whole of permissible language, and are quite unaware of the fact that there is a vast swelling of the ocean, even outside the Mississippi River, and that this must be met. A lexicographer can see that this wider swelling of water must be met, not just one river. And so yes, we do run into people who express surprise. I don't know -- don't understand it.

MacNEIL: Can you think of some words that have given you particular embarrassment or annoyed people the most as you've, in this country --

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Well, I've had people in my village at home say, "Now how could you, Bot, put in woulda, meaning would have, and coulda, meaning could have, and gonna, meaning going to, and so forth. How could you do that?" And I say, "Because you use these words yourself."

MacNEIL: What determines what goes in and what doesn't go in?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Essentially it's currency. That is, that a word is used now and looks like being used for quite a while to come, that has been used for a little while, is used by essentially the whole community. We can't go into dialect or regional uses very much. But so currency and durability are really the tests.

MacNEIL: And how do you find the words?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Oh, we find them by reading everything. That is, my freelance irregular troops are all over the globe, and they read the Sydney Morning Herald and the Fairbanks, Alaska Daily News Minor and all sorts of other unlikely papers and a lot of learned journals, all the poets, dramatists, writers of one sort or another. Textbooks of atomic physics and archeology and so forth, and we collect the evidence like that. Anything that occurs in the source that's not in the dictionary already, we make a note of it.

MacNEIL: And does it have to have appeared in print a number of times, or if your listener -- if your irregulars, as you call them, were listening to radio talk shows or overhearing conversations in bars and reported usage, would you -- would you include that as well?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Oh yes, we would. If there was sufficient evidence, either from oral sources or from written sources or from both or from our own personal knowledge or from our common sense or what we happen to hear on the radio that morning or whatever, all of it would be put together, and a word would not be put in on the slenderest possible evidence, but only if it passes the double test of current and likely to last. Those are the things which we judge words by.

MacNEIL: And I suppose one of the things you're aiming for is that some reader a generation from now, who's a generation away from a slang word that's very common -- like yucky in this country -- would, if he came across it in books, could find out what it meant by going to the dictionary.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Well, exactly. Yesterday the --

MacNEIL: Even though it was no longer in --

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Yes. The Prime Minister of Canada talked about he felt as if he was kicked in the slats -- S-L-A-T-S -- kicked in the slats. Well, you've only to look up in my voilume four, and that expression is perfectly well explained, its history given, how it fits into the network of the word slat. In the 21st Century, they'll be probably kicked somewhere else.

MacNEIL: You spent 30 years on this. The language is constantly changing. Even now you've got it set in type and published. Isn't it almost immediately going to start being out of date?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Dictionaries tend to be out of date the moment they're published, but not seriously. It's only just a little trickle of out of dateness. It takes a while. But the terrible scourge of AIDS is known to every person throughout the world now, but the word is not yet in the biggest Oxford dictionary.

MacNEIL: So what will you do about that?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: It's going to go into our electronic data base, which we're plotting and planning and doing right now. And we've got an entry all ready to get into that electronic data base the moment that we've reached zed putting the main body of words in.

MacNEIL: So in other words, the dictionary will come to exist on -- in a computer or on floppy disks.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Yes. We're working now towards that, and within three years it will exist in electronic form and also available on floppy disks or compact disks or whatever you might call them.

MacNEIL: And then how often will you be able to update that?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Daily.

MacNEIL: Daily?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Yes. From then on it will be an automatic daily process, just like the stock exchange reports, the Dow Jones index, whatever. We'll be right in there with the latest words every single day.

MacNEIL: You have been 30 years doing this. What are you going to do now, now that you've finished this?

Mr. BURCHFIELD: Well, I thought it was probably unwise to start on another 30 year project. Manny Shinwell died at 103, but I didn't see myself lasting for that long.

MacNEIL: He was a British politician.

Mr. BURCHFIELD: He was a British politician, yes. And I'm starting to work on a book to replace the legendary and famous Fowler's Modern English Usage. I'm frightened to death. Whether I can do or not remains to be seen. He virtually became a monk. He worked in Guernsey in a cottage and shut himself off from the world and came out with this legendary book. Well, I'm not prepared to do that. I'm prepared to work hard. And whether I can do it I don't know. But I'm going to have a shot.

MacNEIL: Well, Robert Burchfield, thank you very much for joining us.

LEHRER: Again, the major stories of this Tuesday.President Reagan decided to retire two nuclear submarines to sustain compliance with the unratified SALT II treaty. But his spokesman said this unilateral compliance will end of the Soviets continue to violate the treaty's terms. The State Department announced the Soviet Union has agreed to allow the emmigration of 117 people to the United States to reunite members of 36 different families. And a three judge federal panel announced it will appoint a special prosecutor to probe the lobbying activities of former White House aide Michael Deaver. The announcement said the Justice Department had requested the appointment. Good night, Robin.

MacNEIL: Good night, Jim. That's our News Hour tonight. We will be back tomorrow night. I'm Robert MacNeil. Good night.